Love You To Death

“Stay out of my dreams,” I whispered under my breath. I peeled my eyes open and quickly realized I was alone in my bed. Alone. It was a feeling I’d become so accustomed to. It had been a few weeks since I’d politely asked Sara to move somewhere else—anywhere else. In that same timeframe, Mitch was burning the evidence without me. Taking care of the loose ends without me. Living without me. I couldn’t live without him, but I forced myself to, even if it was only temporary. 

This morning was like every other morning. I was jobless, at least for the time being, and I had been spending a lot of my mornings sleeping in late. I felt like I could never get enough rest. And, while I had certainly tried, having nightmares every night wasn’t helping at all. They were different every time, but they all had one thing in common: the Bleeding Rose Society. The more time that went on, the more I came to realize that I wished I was there with him, destroying all the evidence. Looking at all the evidence. Reading it. Studying it. I had regrets about becoming uninvolved and detaching myself from it. There were so many things I wanted to know, so many things I felt that I’d never know now that it was over. It bothered me. It caused me to lose sleep.

Mitch: It’s done.

Nettie: Sorry, what’s done?

Mitch: The evidence has been burned.

Nettie: Like physically? I feel like that would be a lot of flames, a lot of smoke.

Mitch: No. Not much burning going on here. Except for one thing.

Nettie: What?

Mitch: You burned me down.

Nettie: I needed space.

Mitch: You told me to let you know when it was done. Everything is taken care of. Still need space?

I avoided answering him for a few minutes, only because I wasn’t sure how to say what I wanted to say. It was a conversation that needed to happen in person, although I doubted that either of us could handle that.

Nettie: I think we should talk in person. Are you free?

Mitch: I’m free because of you.

Nettie: Not what I meant.

Mitch: I’ll come over.

I put down my phone and rolled over in bed, tossing the covers over my head dramatically. Fuck. I hadn’t seen him since that day. That day was too much for me. And as much as he had done his best to ask for my forgiveness, to explain why he did what he did, to make up for all that he’d said, I couldn’t fully move past it. I grabbed a quick shower and tossed on some makeup, a pair of jeans, and a baggy band tee. While I wanted to be presentable, I didn’t want to look good. I didn’t want him to want me. It would only make things harder. Before I could even gather my dirty laundry and my emotions from off the bedroom floor, there was a knock at the door.

“Come in,” I said softly, looking down at my feet as I held the door open. He walked in, and I closed it and followed him to the kitchen table, sitting across from him but refusing to look at him.

“You have to look at me eventually. You know that, right?”

“No,” I whispered, shaking my head and burying my face in my hands.

“Yes,” he said, pulling my wrists out from under my chin and sliding his hands down into mine. I brought my gaze to our hands on the table and examined the way he immediately interlocked our fingers together. Like we were still together. Like no time had passed. His hands were still marked with light scars from where he’d slammed them against the two-way mirror that day. “Talk to me, Nettie.”

“I don’t know how to,” I admitted hesitantly.

“Then look at me at least.” When I still refused to turn my gaze toward him, his hands left mine, and he grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him. I squeezed my eyes shut tightly as if there was a way that I could avoid eye contact forever. “I’ll make this easy. Why don’t you start by telling me why you won’t look at me?” he asked.

“Because I’m afraid,” I said, opening my eyes but leaving them cast down.

“You don’t need to be afraid of me. I told you that I didn’t mean anything I said. I explained everything to you. It will never happen again, doll. So why are you afraid?”

His voice was so sweet, and it hummed pure bass, exactly the way it always had. It warmed me up inside, but I steeled myself right away.

“I’m afraid to tell you that I can’t be with you,” I whispered.

“What? Nettie, no…”

“I’m sorry. I just don’t know how to, not after everything that’s happened,” I confessed.

“It’s going to be different, baby. I promise you. You have to let me try to show you,” he said softly.

“I don’t know if I can. I don’t even know where to start.”

“Why don’t you leave that part up to me?” he asked, taking my hands in his again. His fingertips moved gently over my hands, tracing soft patterns on them. I missed his touch, his voice, everything. Just his presence alone was overwhelming, and it was hard to say no. “Will you let me try?” I nodded slowly. “Look at me, baby. Please.”

I finally gave in, allowing my eyes to meet his. They’re perfect. His beautiful, piercing, green eyes were there before me, begging me to come back to him. How could I resist them?

“So, how should we do this? Where do you want to start?” I asked nervously.

“By doing something I’ve wanted to do for weeks now,” he said, standing up and pulling me out of my seat and into his arms. His embrace swallowed me up, and I let his arms consume me. I wanted it. I wanted nothing more than to be wrapped up by him. I sighed, standing there and allowing him to hold me. Amber and cedar. I inhaled deeply, smelling that familiar, intoxicating scent. I breathed it in until I felt like I needed to catch my breath. “Say something, Nettie. Tell me if this is okay.”

“Yes, it’s okay,” I said quietly, feeling my lips tremble as I buried my face in his chest. I didn’t expect it to hit me this hard: that letting him in again was almost as heavy and difficult as letting him go. I started sobbing uncontrollably, knowing that he wouldn’t know what the fuck to do with me if I let it all out.

“Baby, shh. It’s okay.”

His hands were on my back, caressing me softly and working their way up to my neck to move my hair out of the way. He knows the drill. Hold me and let me cry. But I felt my tears slowing as he brought his hands along my jawline and down around my chin, lifting my face to meet his. His eyes were so soft, so caring, so loving, and as much as he’d just changed my mind about letting him in again, I suddenly wanted him to kiss me. Just say it. Say that. Fucking kiss me. As if he could read my mind, his fingertips traced the outline of my pout, and he pulled at my bottom lip gently with his thumb. The feeling of his touch on my lips only confirmed what I already knew: that I wanted that fucking kiss. I bit my lip slowly, not letting my bottom lip go. I wanted him to see it, to know and understand what I wanted without me having to say a word.

“Nettie,” he whispered, his hands surrounding my face as he pulled my lips even closer to his. His lips finally crashed into mine, and I let it happen. As our lips collided, our kiss immediately became passionate and heated. I let his tongue pass between my lips and explore my mouth hungrily. My natural reaction was a soft moan followed by my hands gripping fistfuls of his tight t-shirt, wanting to rip it off of him. I tried to calm myself down and steady my heavy breathing as his hands found my hair and tugged on it roughly, pulling my head back. I released my grip from his shirt until his tongue flicked against mine quickly, unexpectedly, erotically, and I dug my nails into his chest, hoping for more. He moved his hand under my chin, gripping my throat firmly as he pulled me away from his kiss. “Fuck,” he breathed.

“Too much?” I asked innocently.

“Never.”

When his lips met mine again, he kissed me more gingerly, almost as if he was trying to calm himself down, too. As his hands traveled down to my waist, their grip suddenly tightened. I bit his bottom lip slightly to show him that I wanted a rougher kiss, and he reacted instantaneously. His teeth dug into my bottom lip in return, a bite so ravenous and heavy that I pulled back right away, bringing my fingers to my lip and brushing across it gently. When I pulled them away, I noticed a small droplet of blood on them—a droplet that started to grow and spread when I touched my lip again. He grabbed my wrist forcefully, bringing my fingers to his lips and taking them in his mouth. His tongue swirled around them as he tasted my blood for the first time in a month.

“I didn’t mean to,” he whispered, kissing the top of my hand sweetly, then brushing more blood from my bottom lip with his thumb.

“Mitch—”

“—Actually, I did,” he said slyly. He continued to trace his fingers over my bottom lip gently, catching the small amount of blood that spilled from it. As sore as it was, I knew that it was only a small nick. “Baby, say something.”

“I thought things would be different,” I muttered quietly.

“I’m pretty sure you bit me first.”

“I didn’t make you bleed,” I argued.

“You did, actually. I’m bleeding because of you, even though you may not be able to see it.”

I pulled my bottom lip into my mouth, delicately licking the rest of the blood from it. The metallic taste of it was a bitter reminder of our disgusting past—a past I didn’t care to revisit. And while he wasn’t physically bleeding before me, maybe he was right. Maybe I’d made him bleed just as much, yet I’d never noticed it before.

“Show me where,” I requested nervously in a small voice. He took my hand in his and effortlessly placed it over his beating heart. “Fuck,” I breathed.

“It’s not like you meant to do it,” he said, shrugging, a deep sigh erupting at the back of his throat. The bass of it hummed in my ears, lighting my insides ablaze.

“I’ve heard that before. In fact, I’ve said that before,” I reminded him.

“Well, this is different. I know you didn’t want to see me, and—”

“—It’s not that I didn’t want to see you,” I argued, pulling my hands away so that I could focus. “You said some pretty fucked up things to me. And I know that you didn’t mean them; at least, you said that you didn’t. But that doesn’t change the fact that you said them. I know you did what you had to do, but it still hurts.”

“I’m sorry, Nettie. Really.”

“You don’t have to apologize again,” I said flatly.

“Why? Because it’s too late?”

“It’s never too late for apologies. I just don’t need you to keep apologizing. Saying it over and over isn’t going to make it any easier for me. And I know this sounds horribly fucked up, but sometimes I just replay that day in my head. It’s almost as if it’s stuck on repeat in my mind, and I can’t turn it off,” I said, shaking my head in disappointment.

“What can I do? There has to be something I can do to take it away.”

“You can’t fucking take it away. That’s the problem. Put yourself in my position, Mitch. If I ever had you convinced that I didn’t love you, that I never did, would you be able to see past that?” I asked curiously.

“You sort of did,” he sighed.

“When?”

“When you told me that you didn’t want to see me anymore,” he said, folding his arms across his chest uncomfortably.

“I have no fucking clue how to fix this,” I admitted. I wasn’t even referring to fixing the repetition of events in my head; I was referring to fixing our relationship, or what was left of it, anyway.

“I do.”

I had so many questions I wanted to ask, but before I’d even get the chance to open my mouth, he was grabbing my waist and slamming me against the wall in the kitchen. He ran his fingers through my hair, eventually grabbing a fistful of it at the back of my head and pulling it back with force until my lips reached his. He kissed me deeply, holding me still with such an amount of strength that there was no escape for me. I was drowning in his kiss with his sweet, intoxicating tongue wrapping around mine. When I brought my hands up to his chest, he took my wrists and slammed them against the wall above my head, pinning me down and enjoying every minute that I wriggled and squirmed in an attempt to free myself. When I finally gave in, he eased his grip on them, only holding them there with one hand. His other hand drifted down to my face as he delicately started caressing my cheeks with his fingertips. Before long, his hand was at the base of my throat—a familiar spot that it tended to gravitate toward after all this time. I swallowed loudly, and my breath quickened in my chest as his grip tightened around my neck. When he released me from his kiss, his hands stayed in place, not moving an inch.

“Is this how you intend to fix things?” I asked innocently, feeling the discomfort and anxiety at the back of my throat as I swallowed again.

“I’m more concerned about what I intend on breaking than fixing.”